October 1995

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Features

Emerging Viruses

Hemorrhagic fever viruses are among the most dangerous biological agents known. New ones are discovered every year, and artificial as well as natural environmental changes are favoring their spread

By Bernard Le Guenno

Companions to Young Stars

The surprising finding that even the youngest stars commonly exist in sets of two or three has revised thinking about the birth of star systems

By Alan P. Boss

Quantum-Mechanical Computers

Quantum-mechanical computers, if they can be constructed, will do things no ordinary computer can

By Seth Lloyd

Demolition by Implosion

Detonation of small quantities of strategically placed explosives can demolish an unwanted high-rise in a matter of seconds

By J. Mark Loizeaux and Douglas K. Loizeaux

The Molecular Logic of Smell

Mammals can recognize thousands of odors, some of which prompt powerful responses. Recent experiments illuminate how the nose and brain may perceive scents

By Richard Axel

The Laboratory Notebooks of Thomas Edison

The raw visual and textual evidence of his imagination, Edison's notebooks were the unrevealed talismans of the inventor's career

By Neil Baldwin

Can Environmental Estrogens Cause Breast Cancer?

The authors of a provocative hypothesis spell out their reasons for suspecting that hormone-mimicking chemicals in the environment contribute to many unexplained cases of breast cancer

By Devra Lee Davis and H. Leon Bradlow

Departments

Hidden Scars

The New Social Darwinists

Letters

Letters to the Editors, October 1995

Recommended

Reviews--Lunar Odyssey

50, 100 & 150 Years Ago

50, 100 and 150 Years Ago: Broadcasting from Planes, Louis Pasteur and the Gulf Stream

Profile

Thinking Globally, Acting Universally

Mathematical Recreation

The Never-Ending Chess Game

Science and the Citizen

Seeing the Forest for the Trees

Beyond Neptune

Why so Blue?

High Tension

A Pox on the Pox

Giving your All

A Tight Fit

Endangered Again

These Feet were made for Walking--And?

Are Band-Aids Enough for Third World Debt?

By the Numbers

Deaths Caused by Breast Cancer, by County

Departments

The Controversy over the End of Science

Science Travel

More Coral Trouble

Field Notes

3 Rms, Ocean View

Technology and Business

Slash and Burn

Writing on the Fringe

An Acid Test

Theres No Place like Cyberspace

A Tiny Gutenberg

Soft Wear

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